August, 2011

Inside this issue:

Camp Reach Newsle er

Support For Camp Reach

1

Design Project Updates 2

Reunions 3

Alumnae and Staff News

4 & 6

Science and Engineering News

5

STEM Saturdays 6

Seniors College Plans 7

Contact Info 7

Email/Address Change 7

Apologies for the Late Newsletter

Hi Camp Reach Alums,

We just wanted to apologize for the timing of this year’s newsletter. Things were really busy this year prepping for Camp Reach. In addition, Sue changed positions within WPI and is now working in the Admissions department. This change, coupled with some vacation time, caused the delay in the newsletter.

We hope you all had a great summer and we were really excited to see so many of you at the summer reunion. We hope that you had a great time as well. Check inside for some fun pictures. We also have some updates on several of the design projects including a really nice recognition that we received from the Friendly House.

In the interest of saving paper and becoming green, we will be sending the newsletter in an electronic format only after this edition. Please contact us and let us know if you would prefer to continue to receive a paper version. You can either call (508)831-5819 or email us at reach@wpi.edu. Also if your email address has changed recently, please email us to let us know your current address.

Looking forward to hearing from you,

Audra, Chrys and Sue

Camp Reach in 2011— both the two-week program and all of the alumnae activities— is made possible by donations from the following organizations and individuals who are committed to supporting young wom-en and to diversifying our nation’s technological workforce. Together they have contributed more than $35,000 to keep tuition low for everyone and to provide additional financial aid to those with need. Our sincere thanks for your generous support!

United Way of Central Massachusetts’ Women’s Initiative Raytheon NCS Teradyne, Inc.

EMC Karl Storz Endovision, Inc.

The England Charitable Trust WPI Alumni and Friends Friends of Camp Reach

Support for Camp Reach

PAGE 2 CAMP REACH NEWSLETTER AUGUST, 2011

Design Project Updates

Design Project Updates New Play Area at the Jewish Community Center (JCC) The JCC has completed the first phase of an in-door/outdoor family play center for parents and their toddlers. The indoor space is finished, and on June 20 the project team from Camp Reach 2010 (aka Team Shooting Stars) returned to the JCC to help with some maintenance tasks to clear the way for use of the outdoor space. In the coming months our JCC contact Karen Rosen will be asking for donations for the new items recommended in the team’s design for the play area, so stay tuned!

Photo (from left to right): Lorraine N, Lauren V, Kylie L, Janie M, Hope C, Lizzie S, Eveline R, Dalena T. Celebration at Friendly House for the 2006 and 2010 Project Teams On June 23, the staff and families at Friendly House’s shelter at 87 Elm Street hosted a celebration honoring the project teams from Camp Reach 2006 and 2010. Both teams played a major role in making the property saf-er and more attractive for residents and neighbors. The 2006 project team investigated ways to relocate an ugly dumpster, made suggestions for improving the backyard play area, researched how to replace a missing section of wrought-iron fence, and developed a plan for tree, shrub, and perennial plantings. The 2010 team focused on the wheelchair ramp: making sure it was ADA compliant, analysing options for replacing the rotted-out wood railings, and adding non-slip surfacing. Worcester Mayor Joseph O’Brien and City Councillor Barbara Haller attended the ceremony and extended thanks from the city and neighborhood.

Left photo: Anna O, Shira T, Karin P, and Carolynne M from the Reach 2010 project team are holding a plaque that will be mounted on the house. It lists names of contributing Camp Reach alumnae and staff and reads: “WPI Camp Reach Program. In recognition of their work in improving the Friendly House shelter’s landscaping and handicapped accessibility.” Right photo: Katie S from the 2006 project team helps plant a crabapple tree at the corner of the property. Her “dumpster buddy” Erin D (left-most in photo) from the 2006 team also attended.

(Continued on page 7)

PAGE 3 CAMP REACH NEWSLETTER AUGUST, 2011

REUNIONS Winter:

March 5, 2011 This year’s winter reunion had to be rescheduled due to a forecasted snow storm that never materialized. Never-theless, the reunion that did take place

in March was fun for everyone.

We had about 44 former campers who came for the afternoon. We start-ed with a glow in the dark slime making activity.

Once we all had a good portion of slime we headed over to the bowl-ing alley to see what the slime would look like under the UV lights. After bowling, we all returned to the Campus Center for a pizza din-ner! As you can tell from the

pictures...we had a great time!!!

Summer: July 22, 2011

In contrast, the weather for the sum-mer reunion was perfect! Warm and sunny. We had a great group of alums who joined us to welcome our new class of 2011 campers. The 2010 campers especially impressed us with their record at-tendance. 16 of the former 2010 campers attended the reunion. Can your class beat that next reunion? We started the night off with a BBQ and then a water balloon toss just to get everyone in the party mood. We had a chance to tie dye t-shirts. We finished the evening with an awesome Karaoke session. Everyone was still singing when their parents came to pick them up!!

2010 Campers with the WPI goat!

Former TAs catching up!

Alumna from the class of 2009

2010 Campers

2009 Campers

The TAs 

PAGE 4 CAMP REACH NEWSLETTER AUGUST, 2011

From Alumnae and Staff

passions for medicine and neuroscience. In the fall I will be attending Hampshire College in Amherst where I will be studying Pre-Med, neuroscience. I will also be working on the Hampshire EMS squad. As for now, I am working at T.C. Lando’s and getting ready for col-lege. I am really excited about all that lies ahead and I wish the best of luck to everyone in following your dreams and reaching for the stars!

Rachel Whaley05

I can't believe we're graduating! This summer I'll be doing some babysitting and relaxing before I head off to the University of Chicago in the fall. Best of luck to eve-ryone at college next year!

Eliana Perlmutter ‘06

I've had a very busy but exciting Junior year. This fall I had a terrific time learning and traveling in Israel with many of my classmates. When I returned I joined the robotics team that was started at my school this year. I did not expect to get so caught up in it but it has been such a fun challenge. My team qualified for the World Championship in St. Luis, MO. At the World Champi-onship my team ended up winning the highest award in our league for the technological aspects of the robot, our science outreach, helping other teams, and our docu-

mentation of the progress of our robot and team. In St. Louis there was a surprise concert by the Black Eyed Peas for all of the compe-tition par-

ticipants and they surprised us by announcing that we had won be-tween sets of the concert. I'm ex-cited to become a manager of the team this coming year. I can't wait to be back at Camp Reach this summer as a TA!

Katie Sands ‘06

I am very pleased to see the Friendly House project I started during my time at Camp Reach finally take flight! This year has been a busy one. For my AP Lan-guage and Comp. class this year my friend Kristin and I initiated a lockbox program in Princeton which had fairly good success which is exciting! I am also excited to start my first year at Johnson and Wales University in Providence, RI a year early next year due to an early entrance program. I will be studying Sports and Enter-tainment Event Management with a minor in Market-ing. I miss everyone! Hope all is well.

(Continued on page 6)

Ashley Racicot ‘05 

Hi Camp Reach Alums!

It has now been six years since I attended Camp Reach, and trust me, a lot has changed since then. I really wanted to be an engineer and attend MassAcademy and WPI back then, and my best friend was the person who was unsure of what exactly her future would bring. Our roles have sort of switched now. We both graduate from Shepherd Hill Regional High on June 5, and after grad-uation she'll be attending WPI with a major in chemical engineering and I'll be heading to Heidelberg Universi-ty in Tiffin, Ohio. Most of you are probably like "she's crazy; where the heck is that?" and yeah, I get that a lot. Heidelberg is a liberal arts college in the north of Ohio. Contrary to a lot of teens, I am not going away to college because I hate where I come from. I love this community, and I think I'll be back after college. Which is why I chose a college in a totally new location. I want to experience living somewhere else before I spend my whole life here. My primary major is going to be Sec-ondary Education, with a focus in either Spanish, Math, or Music

(can you see how much things have changed? ! ) . I'm about to g r a d u a t e ,

and I still don't know what I wan to be when I grow up, and I think that's okay. I'm just really ready to start this new chapter and see where the rest of life takes me. Best wishes, and always REACH for your dreams!

Julie Sargent ‘05

Hey everyone! I hope you all are enjoying your sum-mers thus far. I have had an amazing senior year and overall high school experience. Outside of the daily cha-os of school - I had the pleasure of interning with the director of functional neurosurgery at UMASS Medical School for over 300 hours! I participated in research, data analysis, Institutional Review Board application writing as well as clinical and surgical observation. I also took a sixth month EMT course and just recently fin-ished the final tests for my EMT-B certi-fication. These oppor-tunities have helped me to solidify my

CONGRATULATIONS to everyone in the Camp Reach Classes of 2001 and 2005

who graduated from college or high school this year!! Best wishes and please stay in

touch!

PAGE 5 CAMP REACH NEWSLETTER AUGUST, 2011

Girls Sweep the Google Science Fair

Girl power rules! In the first an-nual Google Global Science Fair, the three top winners were all girls. To read more about the winners and their projects visit this website:

http://students.egfi-k12.org/girls-sweep-google-science-fair

Think that you could be one of the winners next year? If you are interested in finding out how to enter the 2012 event visit this website: http://www.google.com/events/sciencefair/index.html

Laser Bike Light Helps Protect Cyclists Emily Brooke a student at the Uni-versity of Brighton’s School of Com-puting, Engineering and Mathemat-ics in England has invented a type of portable, virtual bike lane. Her small battery powered device projects a glowing green signal onto the road

to alert drivers of a cyclists presence. To read more about Emily and her concern for the safety of cyclists...visit this website.

http://www.brighton.ac.uk/news/2011/110601bicycle_blaze.php?PageId=810

Making Light of Sleep

Do you ever have trouble sleeping? Or just stay up too late on the computer or watching TV? Usually, that means struggling through the next day tired.

Well researchers have found it may not be just bad habits on your part. Apparently your biological clock may be pushing forward causing you to be unable to fall asleep

so early. And the light coming from your computer screen or TV could be pushing you to stay up even lat-er. You can influence this clock by getting the right kind of light. Blue light (sunlight is a great source of this) helps to wake you up so try to get lots of exposure to this in the mornings. Unfortunately, television screens and computer screens also emit blue light, which may be why you have trouble going to sleep in the evenings. To read more on this research, visit the website below.

http://www.sciencenewsforkids.org/2010/03/making-light-of-sleep-2/

First Robotics Teams Up With will.i.am and Other Stars 'i.am FIRST - Science is Rock and Roll' is

a groundbreaking, one-hour special promoting education, science, and technology that features an electric hour of highlights from the 20th annual FIRST Champion-ship. This very special celebration of technology features performances by The Black Eyed Peas and Willow Smith, as well as special appearances from a host of high-profile celebrities such as Justin Bieber, Jack Black, Bono, Mi-randa Cosgrove, Miley Cyrus, Josh Duhamel, Willow Smith, Britney Spears, Snoop Dogg, Justin Timberlake, and Steven Tyler speaking out to support STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) education. If you did-n’t see the special you can view the video at this website http://iamfirst.dipdive.com/

Science and Engineering News

SAVE THE DATE!

We already know the date of our Winter reunion: Saturday, Febru-ary 4th from 3-6 PM.

We hope you can come!

PAGE 6 CAMP REACH NEWSLETTER AUGUST, 2011

Gabbie Bouyea ‘07

Hey everyone! I can't wait for summer! I've had a great year of school and I cannot believe that I'm going to be a junior in highschool next year! The highlights of my year were getting into the pre-professional dance company (Catalyst) at my school (Pioneer Valley Performing Arts), being a TA for the middle school songwriting class at my school, and also being in my school's annual musical produc-tion (which was Hairspray)! I'll miss seeing my friends every day but I'm extremely excited for summer as well! I get out of school on the 17th of June. Then, the week after that, my family is leaving for a two week trip to a bunch of different national parks including Glacier National Park and Yellowstone! At the end of July I am going to be a TA for Camp Reach for the first time and I am so excited!!! I will spend the rest of the summer swimming, reading, going to six flags, and practicing for cheerleading (which I recently started in my town)! It's going to be busy, but I can't wait! I hope everyone is doing well and I hope to see you all at the reunion this summer!

Heather Domenicis ‘09

Hey Guys! Hope all my Camp Reach friends had a good year, 'cause I sure did. I was in Hairspray at my school and got pretty good grades all year. I'm going to sleep-away camp this summer (the normal, outdoors-y kind),

and I'm going to Florida in August. I'm also going to be in yet another show this summer, but luckily I'll be able to see you guys at the reunion! Can't wait for sum-mer!

Samantha Murphy-Cripps '09

Hey its Sam and I just wanted to let you guys now that I am going to Worcester Tech for high school and on June 9th will be inducted into the National Junior Hon-or Society. My plans at Tech are to go into early child-hood and then college to become a 7th or 8th grade math teacher. Can’t wait for the reunion. See you all soon.

Brandis Haugabrook ‘10

Hey everyone!

Wow, where do I begin? It's been forever. Well, this year seemed to go by pretty quickly for me,same as last.It's been a little more hectic, though. More tests, MCAS, and MAPS, and this year we were placed into our math classes for 8th grade. We had to take the IO-WA test. It seemed fairly easy. I guess that's why I was placed in Algebra I, the 9th grade math class!

The summer's going to be a great relief. I'm SO tired of school right now. Too much going on. But who wouldn't be? My family and I will be hosting two kids who live in suburban/urban New York and will be staying with us for a week. Last year I missed seeing them because I was at Camp Reach. It's alright though, because I got to talk with them over email (and the phone that one day). I can't wait to see how much they've grown.

My weekends are stuffed with sports and other events. Every Saturday I have gymnastics for an hour, then my brother had a baseball game, then I have softball prac-tice. We still have time to head over to the YMCA to go to Teen Nite, a night only dedicated for the 5th- 8th graders that live in my town. Every Sunday I have a softball game, then bolt off to our next event, whether it's a birthday party or just a get-together. Soemetimes, I still don't see how I have time to do the PILES of homework I get on Fridays.

Well, I don't want to waste your time talking about my boring/crazy life, so I'll just end it here.

STEM

Saturdays Sponsored by Intel

Science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM) topics are the focus of three half daywork-shops offered this year. STEM Saturdays are open to middle school-aged children—and their parents or guardians. Each child’s session will focus on hands on activities. Parents and guardi-ans will participate in sessions that outline meth-ods for motivating their children to excel in STEM fields. The events will include speakers, litera-ture, and discussions on how to continue playing an active role in learning about and promoting STEM fields.

Upcoming dates for STEM Saturdays are: Novem-ber 5, 2011, February 4, 2012, and April 7, 2012. The cost of the program is $25 per Saturday, and financial assistance is available. Please contact the Office of Diversity and Women's Programs at 508-831-5819 to request a registration packet.

Participants can register for ANY date, and participation in all dates is NOT required.

PAGE 7 CAMP REACH NEWSLETTER AUGUST, 2011

A few of our graduating seniors from the Camp Reach class of 2005 let us know what colleges they will be attending next year. If you did not have a chance to share, please let us know for the January newsletter!!

Nicole Klei will be attending Cornell University in New York next year and majoring in engineering.

Amy Mouradian is planning on attending Bryant Uni-versity in Smithfield Rhode Island. She will be majoring in communications and minoring in psychology and business.

Ashley Racicot will be attending Heidelberg Universi-ty in Tiffin, Ohio in the fall. Her major will be Spanish Education.

Julie Sargent will be attending Hampshire College in Amherst where she will be studying Pre-Med, neurosci-ence.

Kyle Schmidt will be attending WPI in the fall.

Abeer Sayeed will be attending Northeastern Universi-ty in the fall, majoring in biochemistry and taking the pre-med track.

Lauren Vignaly will be attending Johns Hopkins Uni-versity in Maryland and majoring in biomedical engi-neering.

Rachel Whaley will be attending the University of Chicago.

Seniors 2011 College Plans

CONTACT INFORMATION: Send e-mail to reach@wpi.edu with general inquiries, or contact:

Audra Gaul WPI Office of Women’s Programs 100 Institute Rd. Worcester, MA 01609 (508) 831-5819 agaul@wpi.edu

Sue Sontgerath WPI Admissions Office 100 Institute Rd. Worcester, MA 01609 (508) 831-5286 ssont@wpi.edu

We want your new postal ad-dress and E-MAIL!

If you move: Please take a moment to contact us, either by phone, let-ter, or e-mail. We very much want to keep in contact with everyone!

AND if you get access to e-mail or change your e-mail address please let us know so we can update our e-mail

list! This allows you to get an-nouncements of Reach events as soon as they are known, as well as other useful postings (typically no more than one per month).

There is an easy form you can use on the Reach website to submit changes in postal and e-mail ad-

d r e s s e s . T h e R e a c h w e b s i t e i s http://www.wpi.edu/+reach, and the change of address form is in the Alumnae section.

Boys and Girls Club (2010): This team developed a plan for convert-ing a closet to a sound booth, to im-prove the club’s youth music pro-grams. The project stalled a bit when our contact transferred to an-other club location, but Chrys met recently with the new Director of Operations. At present, funds are not available for the sound-proofing foam, but they are contacting other youth clubs with sound booths to get tips on finding donations or lowering costs. Stay tuned!

Broad Meadow Brook (2010): This team investigat-ed ways in which the Bachand House next to Broad Meadow Brook Wildlife Sanctuary could be renovat-

ed with “green” features and serve as a home for the sanctu-ary’s education programs. Several months ago we heard from Mar-tha Gach that their state Board of Directors requested consideration of an alternative plan—to con-struct a new building on sanctu-ary property. When plans are fur-

ther along we’ll schedule a gathering there to learn more!

(Design Projects continued from page 2)